Opposites
by Fancy Pants Penguin Jiao-Jie
Summary: This is a multichapter story of two very different yet surprisingly similar sets of siblings: Zuko and Azula, and Sokka and Katara and how they change over time; either growing closer or drifting apart.
1. Hide and Explode

**Hide and Explode**

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><p>It had been dark for almost an hour, but a seven year-old princess was still awake, and in fact, was running circles around her brother. Zuko sat cross legged on a bench in his family's courtyard, elbows resting on his knees as he watched the little girl run around and around. She was giggling at random intervals and had obviously had too many gummy platypus bears at her birthday party earlier in the day.<p>

"Pleeaase Zuko!" Azula whined, skidding to a stop in front of him, her breathing labored.

"You've been playing all day, aren't you tired?" her brother asked, and the little princess felt her bottom lip poke out into a pout. The party had consisted of countless friends and admirers, firebenders, jugglers, magicians and lots of lots of candy and slowly throughout the day the act of a proper princess had slowly deteriorated into a very excited little girl, which is what Zuko now saw in front of him. Truthfully, he was a bit jealous of what a big deal was made over his sister's 7th birthday, and he was a little too annoyed to want to play with her now.

"Come on, you're not even doing anything! And I want to play hide and explode!" she squealed, bouncing a little for emphasis. The day had been so exciting, so full of games and happiness that the princess just wasn't ready for it to end.

Zuko's eyes flickered to the scroll still sat in his lap, but it was much too dark now to claim he was reading. "Suyin is going to come get you for bed soon," he attempted, although the princess could tell from his tone that he was about to give in. It _was_ her birthday.

The girl raised her eyebrows and tilted her chin down. "Zuuzuu," she whined.

The prince in question sighed, placing his scroll on the bench beside him and setting his feet down. "Fine," he replied. Azula's face cracked into a smile and the boy covered his eyes. "Go hide, then! Only outside and in porches, not in the main palace," he added.

"Okay," Azula agreed; these were the usual rules. Not only was the palace so large that it could take Zuko hours to find her, but it was also littered with off-limits rooms and areas that weren't for children. Besides, they could break something.

Now the girl rushed away from her brother, leaping over the railings surrounding the path and to the other side of the courtyard, enjoying the warm summer air on her skin. The princess passed the tree by the turtle duck pond, Zuko's usual hiding place, and briefly considered hiding behind the flowers lining the wooden walkway along the palace walls. _No, that won't work either,_ she thought. The paper doors were flung open to welcome the breeze and the light from within would make her too easy to spot.

Azula stopped running and turned in a slow circle, scanning the courtyard. Zuko's voice echoed across the empty square, he was already on eleven, which meant the princess only had nineteen more seconds to find a suitable place. Her chest bubbled with excitement; she loved being the hider, which meant Zuko was usually forced into being the finder, one of the reasons he didn't play with her much anymore.

Then she saw it. It was the perfect hiding place; a large, bronze pot on the edge of the wooden walkway with one side conveniently shielded from the palace's light. The princess plopped down behind the pot, pulling her knees up to her chest and carefully ensuring that her tunic and her bun were concealed in shadow.

"Fourteen…" Zuko called.

Azula smiled to herself, a warm summer breeze brushing across her face. Earlier in the day, for her party, it had been uncomfortably hot, and luckily the palace wasn't short on servants to fan the party guests, but now that the sun was down it had turned into one of those nights that Azula loved. The moon was only a sliver of light in the sky, but the glow from the palace bathed the edges of the courtyard in a warm, orange light. It felt comfortable and looking at her home from this perspective it seemed loving and inviting; this was in sharp contrast to the usual regal and sharp feeling that the palace held.

It was on nights like this that Azula could play with her brother and together they could forget about the royal etiquette and be children and it seemed to her that they were just like every other brother and sister in the world, who weren't a prince and a princess.

"Twenty-five…"

Giddily, the normally stoic girl smiled to herself. Something inside of her felt whole and bursting and she wished that she would never forget this feeling. It seemed to her that in recent days she had seen less of her brother, both of them attending different schools, and when they were together they would be pitted against each other in firebending sparring. They were quickly becoming less like siblings and more like rivals, and while the girl didn't quite understand what was happening yet, she felt the need to be_ better _than Zuko. Always better. A sort of panicked jealousy arose every time he surpassed her, which only made her try harder and somewhere both of them knew that the competition was pulling them apart.

"Thirty!" Zuko called victoriously. Azula couldn't see from her position, but she assumed he stood up.

"Where aare you…?" her brother called. Now she could hear him step over the path, no doubt checking the tree first.

_Pfft,_ Azula thought, _like I would hide in his favorite place._ It would be way too easy. She heard him wander around the garden, checking this or that spot, including behind the plant she had considered, and he stepped onto the deck. He was getting close and Azula grinned, waiting for her chance.

_Two more steps, _she thought as Zuko stopped and peered into the doorway, checking to see if she had cheated; it had happened before. He took another step, and Azula could imagine the frown that he would be wearing, eyebrows knit together; her excitement was almost too much to contain, this was her favorite part, but it could only happen if he got within one step without noticing her.

Finally, Zuko took the last step and at almost the same time his foot landed, the princess leapt into action, literally.

"BOOM!" she shouted at the top of her lungs, and jumped out of her hiding place. Zuko gasped and jumped backwards, laughing. Azula started to giggle, but her brother's foot caught the threshold of the door, and he stumbled backwards inside. The princess leapt forward to grab his arm, but, being heavier, Zuko just pulled her over as well and the two of them tumbled to the side into a shelf against the wall.

Time instantly slowed down and the siblings stared at a glass figure on the top shelf. It wobbled only twice before the momentum took over and the bird tipped forward. Somehow, her mind was running in hyper speed and yet instead of steadying the statue, Azula's thoughts flashed back to when her mother first placed the elegant lion-stork figure on the empty shelf and explained that it was a gift from her own father, the grandfather that Azula had never met, when she had studied the long delicate feathers in awe, and then later when the remaining shelves were filled with scrolls.

Zuko must have kept his wits and he dove onto his stomach to catch the glass statue, bumping his chin on the ground, which looked painful from his sister's perspective. A second later the shelf came toppling over to land on his back, scrolls spilling across the floor. Azula winced when she heard a muffled 'clink' and she finally jumped into action to lift the shelf off enough for her brother to crawl out.

"Are you okay?" she asked, actual concern painted across her face.

He nodded but by the way he was hunching she knew his back was injured. That, the small scrape on his chin and the thin trail of blood dripping were overshadowed by the look of fear and worry on his face. In one hand he held an outstretched wing, while the other contained the rest of the bird, only its beak and part of the mane missing.

Unluckily for the two, they didn't have much time to think about what they did before Suyin and another servant burst in to check on the sound. The elderly woman gasped, while the girl turned around and hurried down the hall, presumably to tell Princess Ursa what happened to her lion-stork.

"What have you two done?" she asked, frowning at the children and gently taking the pieces of the sculpture from Zuko; Suyin had never been afraid to scold Azula or Zuko, regardless of whose grandchildren they might be. Both the prince and princess bowed their heads. "You've been told thousands of times not to play so roughly and this is exactly the reason."

Azula glanced at Zuko out of the corner of her eye, but he didn't notice, only stared solemnly at the floor, frowning. With one hand he reached up to wipe the blood off his chin and the girl went back to staring at her slippers.

"What happened?" Suyin asked sternly.

Both children began speaking at the same time, "It was an acc—" Zuko started, but cut himself off when he realized what his sister was saying.

"It was Zuko's fault, I didn't do anything, he's clumsy," she was using the innocent face that always worked on Father, and paired with the whiny voice it did the trick; Zuko _was_ a little clumsy and Azula was scared of their parents' wrath, mostly Father's.

"Come with me Zuko we need to talk to your parents," Suyin chided. The princess was only slightly relieved. She felt a small twinge in her heart; she had thrown her brother under to save herself. "It's time for you to go to bed, Azula."

_But Mother likes him more anyway,_ she thought, trying to console herself. The girl didn't dare look to her left to see Zuko's face. No doubt he was staring at her with an open mouth and she couldn't bear to see that look of betrayal. She could hear Suyin leading her brother out of the room, and finally she dared to turn her head enough to glance at Zuko's face. He wasn't looking at her, but instead stared straight ahead, his mouth in a straight line and his eyebrows knit together in anger.

By the time both her nursemaid and her brother had left Azula standing amongst the scrolls, the princess wished she had shared the blame and her heart was heavy as she trudged to her bedroom.

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><p><strong>AN:** Yes! I'm back from my hiatus, and I hope that you readers liked this chapter. The next one will not be about Zuko and Azula but I will be coming back to them in good time. Please let me know what you think (good or bad), whether it be in review, message, e-mail, or whatever form. =]


	2. House

**House**

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><p>A high pitched shriek echoed through a half-finished igloo. In only a few days a young couple from the village would be married, and per tradition, a new home was being built for them to start their life together. But now it sat empty, a gaping hole in the roof leaving it open to the sky but allowing the few short hours of sun to shine in as the young girl took a deep breath and screamed again.<p>

Sokka jerked on the end of her braid cutting the scream off in an 'ack' sound, but Katara stretched one arm out further in front of the two of them, keeping her prize out of her brother's reach, and tried in vain to release her hair from his grip with the other.

It had started innocently enough, with the seven year old girl playing house in the empty cabin, followed by her commissioning Sokka to help build snow furniture. For a while (longer than usual) the siblings worked together, and in only a few minutes Katara had a cooking pot, a clothing chest, and a bedroll.

"What else do you want?" her brother asked, smugly eyeing his snow handiwork.

"Uhhm," the girl thought out loud. "A little table?" Yes. Then she could have something to pretend-cut her 'dinner' on when she 'cooked.' But would they be able to get the legs to stand up?

"A table?" Sokka asked, raising an eyebrow. That would be hard to make out of snow. _Maybe we can just make a box?_ he thought, then shrugged and nodded. Being the only boy his age in the village he didn't have much else to do aside from helping his sister, and this was more fun than helping Mom around their own igloo since their dad had gone fishing without him. Truth be told, Sokka wasn't too upset though; since the days were so short this time of year, Dad wouldn't be gone for long.

"Okay, come on," he waved for her to follow him and stepped outside to gather more building materials; they would get in trouble if they dug up the igloo floor.

Several minutes later the two were sitting on the ground, a small pile of snowballs beside them.

"Do you think this is enough?" Sokka asked. It felt a little strange to him, but he was actually having fun helping his sister with one of her silly games.

Katara answered by plunging her gloves into the snow. "One more," she explained patting together one last snowball to bring inside. As she pulled up the ice, the boy noticed something black and shiny amongst the white background.

"Wait! Look," he exclaimed, reaching up and pulling her hands apart.

"Oooh," the girl breathed, her eyes wide as she pulled out a black spearhead. The two leaned together until their foreheads almost bumped each other to get a closer look at their find.

It was like nothing the two of them had ever seen before. Unlike their tribe's weapons, which were made of bone, a medium that resulted in jagged edges and a light gray color, this spearhead was made of some sort of stone. It was of the darkest black, with smooth sides which reflected the sun and although the edges were almost perfectly sharpened Sokka could faintly make out a swirl pattern where the stone had been cleaved. The tip was still intact and appeared to be razor sharp; if Katara had not been wearing her gloves Sokka realized his sister likely would have sliced her hand.

"Cool! Can I look at it?" the boy asked eagerly, reaching for the stone.

"No!" Katara snapped, pulling the blade close to her chest and cupping it with both hands. It was more out of an automated response to not let her brother have what she had than any real aversion to letting him see the spearhead. "It's mine," she added.

"I saw it first!" Sokka argued, reaching for the blade again, annoyed this time; why did Katara have to ruin literally _everything_ when she was around? The little girl was quick though and jumped to her feet, dodging him.

"But I dug it up," she complained loudly, taking a step backwards as her brother stood up.

"I _saw_ it!" retorted the young man, his voice raising. "You wouldn't even have noticed it if it wasn't for me!"

There was a pause when the siblings both waited for the other to act. Sokka made the first move, lunging towards his sister, who ducked to the side and dashed away leaving him to dive face first into the snow. With the short summer days and long cold nights, the snow had time to build up and the boy sunk into the frozen substance up to his chest, resulting in a wild struggle to extricate himself with nothing to grab onto or push against.

After several seconds of clambering and what Sokka reckoned was a gallon of swallowed snow he freed himself, but it was enough time for Katara to escape. Now he scanned the village with narrowed eyes. _Maybe she went home,_ he wondered as his gaze passed over their own igloo; but it was on the far side of the village so there was no way she could have gotten there in time. As an afterthought the boy glanced down at the ground, but the area was littered with footprints from him and his sister plus the men working on the house; there was basically more trampled snow than fresh.

Sokka sighed, shaking his head. There was really only one place for Katara to hidesince this area of the village was mostly empty, left that way on purpose for new igloos. _Dummy…_ the boy thought with a small smirk and jogged around to the front of the unfinished house. Sure enough once he stepped inside the young man was greeted by his sister trying to charge past him. Before she could muscle past he grabbed the easiest thing _to_ grab: her long braid and used it to hold her back whilst attempting to reach the arm holding the arrowhead. The girl screamed.

The two toppled to the side and slammed against the wall of the igloo entrance, but it was sturdy and didn't wobble or crack and Katara let out another, longer, high pitched shriek. With a wince, Sokka yanked her braid, cutting off the scream.

"Just…let me…see it," he gasped out, extending his arm along with her hair behind him to pull her outstretched hand and the spearhead closer.

"It's _mine_!" the seven year-old exclaimed with a surprising amount of force for her situation, although there were tears in the corners of her eyes.

"I just want to—ARGH," Sokka started, but it was his turn to get cut off with a shot to the ribs from his sister's elbow. Her bony arm seemed to poke right through his coat and now the boy pulled on Katara's hair with renewed vigor.

The igloo was once again filled with sharp screeching. The two of them stumbled forward, sliding along the wall. In order to avoid another faceplant Sokka released his hold on his sister's hair and extended his hands to catch himself.

Katara, eyes wide, flailed awkwardly and pushed off the wall to avoid being smashed by her brother. During her wild attempt to roll out of the way, her hand caught the ground.

It was only a moment, and the moment happened in a flash, but the boy remembered it vividly even afterwards. Sokka expected for his sister's hand to collide with the ground of the igloo which had been pounded down for building and was now more ice than snow. He was waiting for the cracking sound her knuckles would make, but to both of their astonishment her arm slid right into the ice like it was made of sea prunes.

Then the moment was over and Sokka pushed himself up, shocked and staring at his sister's arm, which had slid almost up to her elbow into the ground. He was no more confused than Katara herself though and she now gasped, whipping her arm out and spraying her brother with droplets of water.

"Did it just…melt?" Sokka asked as his sister removed her sopping wet glove.

Katara's mouth was agape when she answered, "I…guess so." The spearhead lay forgotten beside her feet as they both stared at the four inch wide hole in the ice that now remained.

"How did you…?" but Sokka never finished his question, as their mother appeared in the doorway, looking distraught.

"I heard screaming," she exclaimed, breathing heavily. "Are you alright?"

The children only got as far as to open their mouths before Kya noticed Katara's messed hair, sopping glove and sleeve and their rumpled clothes. "Were you two fighting?" she accused more than asked, the worry on her face quickly dissolving into anger.

"No," they said simultaneously, followed by a glare from their mother. "Yes," they admitted, looking down.

"We were outside getting snow to make furniture," Katara said quickly.

"And then I found this spearhead," Sokka continued, pointing to the item on the floor.

"No, _I_ found it," the girl argued, but Kya had already retrieved it from the ground. She was frowning.

"You should have given this to me or one of the other adults immediately," their mother said sternly. "It's not something to be playing with and you should know better." She was looking at Sokka.

"I'm sorry, Mom," he said, looking at the ground instead of his mother's eyes. Katara frowned, turning her wet glove around in her hands.

"If you want to convince me you're mature enough to go hunting with your father you need to start proving it," Kya brandished the spearhead. "This is Fire Nation, left over from the raids on our village. One of you could have been seriously hurt, it's still sharp."

"Mom?" Katara said softly, interrupting the lecture. "It isn't Sokka's fault. He told me to give it to him but I wouldn't." She clutched her mitten to her chest. Her brother turned to look at her, shocked.

"Is this true, Sokka?" Kya asked, crossing her arms. Katara met his gaze and widened her eyes, encouraging him to go agree. He turned to their mother and nodded. There was a warm spot in his chest and suddenly, even though he had been yanking on her hair moments early, Sokka felt closer to his sister than he ever had before.

Kya blinked, her eyebrows raised in surprised. "Well…Sokka. Dad should be home soon. You should go meet him and help bring in the catch, your sister needs to clean up this 'furniture' and then we need to have a tal—Oh my goodness, what did you do to the floor?"

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><p><strong>AN:** Well, here's installment two! The next two chapters will take a bit longer since I made sure I had this one mostly done before posting the last, and I will probably do the same with the next set.

I hope you liked it and once again, I'd love to know what you think! Thank you to everyone to read/reviewed/favorite/alerted the last chapter! (Hearts!)


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